Cowherd, a humor columnist for the Baltimore Sun, here collects 75 of his columns on topics ranging from “Rich, Famous and Dead,” through “The Non-Renaissance Man” (about the wages of repairmen and the avoidance of household chores) to “Fun & Games in the ’90s” (about the difficulty of discerning the appropriate restroom for each sex). At his best as a parodist, Cowherd is witty on topics like looking for love in personal ads, or seeking advice from Dear Abby. He is less funny when he turns to whimsy, as in “Mosquitoes Ride Again.” The dozens of black-and-gray blobs throughout the text, which look like Rorschach samples, are neither decorative nor amusing.

Publisher’s Weeekly